


Falling Into Light

by Mithen



Category: DCU - Comicverse
Genre: BDSM, M/M, Red Sunlight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-06-25
Updated: 2007-06-25
Packaged: 2017-10-20 12:15:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/212681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mithen/pseuds/Mithen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clark and Bruce vacation on a pleasure planet under a red sun.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Falling Into Light

The restaurant was quiet and sophisticated; soft music in an alien key, candlelight, white tablecloths. The windows gleamed with the light of the scarlet sun outside, red rays glimmering over the tableware.

Clark Kent looked across the table at his dining companion: Bruce Wayne, in a burgundy sweater, his dark eyes regarding Clark steadily, a hint of a smile on his lips. He raised a glass of wine to Clark and sipped from it.

Clark couldn't hear his partner's heartbeat. Three hours after arriving on Allic, the red sun had sapped his powers enough that he was nearly down to normal human levels of strength and perception. By the end of the meal, he'd probably have no powers left at all. He sipped carefully at his wine, very aware that it would actually affect him now.

He still couldn't believe he'd managed to talk Bruce into taking a vacation together: their first vacation in nearly two years as a couple. Batman generally didn't even acknowledge the existence of "personal time." Yet when Clark had suggested a couple of days away on the most famous pleasure planet in the galaxy, Bruce had grudgingly agreed.

Usually, being under a red sun was a terrifying feeling to Clark. He hated feeling his powers slipping away, his helplessness increasing. But here on a vacation, with no lives to save, no one but Bruce to see him so vulnerable...it wasn't so bad. He had felt his powers draining as if being slowly wrapped in layer after layer of thistledown, gradually muffling sight and sound, his perceptions narrowing down to just the small sphere around him. To the man across the table, currently debating the merits of Allican caviar over Beluga, mostly to himself. Clark smiled slightly and the corner of Bruce's mouth twitched a bit in mid-lecture.

Clark cut another piece of fruit from his plate and lifted it to his mouth. He enjoyed the taste as he looked down at his hands thoughtfully. A very odd thing about being powerless was that as his sight and hearing narrowed down, his sense of touch always seemed to become...more acute. Not more sensitive, exactly: he could no longer feel the subtle differences in texture that he could with his enhanced perception. It was something else, some extra edge or savor to tactile sensation, that wasn't there when he was powered.

Clark put the edge of his knife to his thumb and pressed slightly, just enough to dent the skin, feeling the pressure move slowly toward pain, not quite reaching it. A whole set of stimuli that Superman never felt in ordinary life, a tangible, dizzying feeling of risk to every motion. A potential for pain in every moment. It was like having an extra sense that he didn't have when fully-powered, an...urgency in touch that he wasn't used to at all.

The knife-edge pressed slightly harder. It was almost uncomfortable now. A very odd sensation.

"Clark?" Bruce had stopped talking about the caviar and was looking at him, one eyebrow raised quizzically.

Clark smiled and hastily put down the knife. "The fruit's delicious," he said cheerfully. Bruce nodded and Clark made a more concerted effort to join in the conversation as Bruce changed the topic to Tim's latest training regimen. But he was having a hard time focusing, for some reason. The wine was sweet, the glass cool and smooth against Clark's fingers. Bruce smiled at him and Clark had a hard time not reaching across the table to take Bruce's hand, feel the strong fingers closing around his. Bruce's grip would feel subtly different now, the pressure of bones and sinew more acute, more immediate. But public displays of affection didn't come naturally to either of them, so Clark merely smiled back and gave his opinion about Tim's judo skills.

Crimson light all around them. The world was a tiny sphere, red-lit, just Clark and Bruce within it.

: : :

Clark dropped his small bag on the hall floor and unlocked the hotel door. "The concierge said you'd called ahead to request this room, huh?" Bruce smirked as Clark continued, "As long as it doesn't have a Hello Kitty theme, I think I'll..." His voice trailed off as the door opened.

The room was black: walls, ceiling, and floor were all so dark that it felt like floating in space. The bed was crimson velvet, the only patch of color in the dusky room.

The steel and leather handcuffs and restraints were artfully arranged across the scarlet, gleaming.

Bruce's smirk fell away as Clark swung to stare at him, shocked. "What the hell?" Clark said. "What's that? Who's that for? Me?" His voice rose higher than he had expected at the end of his question and he struggled to get it back down. His heart was pounding and he didn't have the ability to control it anymore.

"I thought--" Bruce paused, seeming to collect his thoughts. "You picked this planet, Clark. You even picked this hotel. Its reputation is well-known for decadence even on a planet entirely devoted to pleasure. I assumed...this was something you..."

"You thought I wanted to...to get handcuffed to a bed and..." Clark felt panic go through him, hot and burning. "Jesus, Bruce!" He took a couple of deep breaths, trying to get his composure back, not sure how to continue. He was next to the bed now, though he didn't even remember entering the room. Velvet shone as red as the sunlight that made it impossible to fly away...

After a while he was able to say calmly enough, "Is this something you want, then? Something you want to do to me?" The words sounded harsh, almost accusing.

Bruce eyed him warily, as if considering many possible answers. "Yes," he said simply after a moment. "It's something I want."

Clark nodded rather jerkily, still riveted by the bed and the gleaming implements on it. "If that's what you want, I'll try. You were willing to come on vacation. The least I can do is...try to make it memorable for you."

Bruce followed him into the room, his eyes opaque and unreadable. Clark put his hand on the cover, feeling the velvet under his fingers with a sort of preternatural clarity. The cuffs glittered like knives. Clark stared at them and waited. He didn't know what he was waiting for.

Behind him, Bruce cleared his throat. "You'll have to get undressed, Clark," he said softly. Clark nodded again and pulled off his sweater in silence, taking off his shoes and socks, unbuckling his pants and letting them drop to the floor to step out of them. The belt buckle made a small sound as it hit the floor; the only sound in the room.

When he was only in his boxers, Clark glanced over at Bruce, standing still fully-clothed. The other man's face was concentrated and sharp, watching him intently. Clark found he was breathing heavily. He put his hands to the waistband of his boxers, but Bruce shook his head as if coming back to himself and interrupted him. "Wait. We need a safeword."

"A--a--" Clark's voice stalled out. "I don't think--I mean, are you sure we need one?"

Bruce's eyebrows twitched slightly. "I'm not doing a damn thing to you without precautions, Clark. How about 'Kryptonite?' That's not a word you're likely to use in the heat of passion." Clark was still staring at him; Bruce frowned. "Clark. Whatever I'm doing, I'll stop if you say 'Kryptonite.'" The frown deepened when Clark didn't respond. "Do you understand that, Clark?"

"Yes," Clark said rather faintly. What was Bruce intending to do to him that required a safeword? How far was he planning to push him? How much was he planning to hurt him?

Abruptly, Clark realized he was desperately hard, his erection pushing against his boxers, already slick with pre-cum. He wasn't sure when that had happened. Bruce's eyes flicked down and then back up to Clark's face, and he took a long, slow breath. "Take off your underwear, Clark," he said levelly.

Clark slid them off slowly and stood there naked, watching Bruce watching him. Naked, vulnerable, his senses tamped down to this place, this moment...Clark felt himself harden more as Bruce looked at him, and he bit his lip. He was doing this for Bruce. He was doing this as a favor to Bruce.

The air in the room was comfortably warm, so Clark had no idea at all why he was shivering so much.

"You can lie down," Bruce noted, and Clark went to the scarlet bed and laid down on it, on his back. The chains binding the cuffs to the bed chimed gently as the bed moved, and Clark felt a faint answering jangle all along his nerves. A wedge of material in the middle of the bed lifted his knees up into a ready position.

Clark picked up one of the ankle cuffs. It was lined with some thick, soft material. He started to slip it around his ankle, but Bruce stepped forward. "Let me." Steady hands closed the cuff over his ankle with a faint, final click. Then he did the other ankle, his hands remaining on the cuff, never brushing Clark's bare skin. Click. Clark's hands were shaking as Bruce slid the manacle around his left wrist. Click. Clark could feel the cuffs, warm and solid, weighing him down as the last one slipped on. Click.

Clark moved his hands cautiously. The cuffs were attached to the bedposts by lengths of chain, giving him a fair amount of freedom. This isn't terribly restraining at all, really, he thought with a pang of what had to be relief but felt almost like disappointment. The strange, dreamy haze that had been hanging over him backed off a little, and he gave Bruce a wry smile, making vague kung-fu motions with his hands. "I think I might still be able to fend off your ravishments, Bruce," he said.

"Put your arms and legs up to the bedposts," Bruce responded. Clark did so, stretching his arms and legs out until they almost touched the four black metal posts. This wasn't going to be so bad. It was just a game, really, nothing serious--

Bruce touched a small black button on the headboard.

At the touch, the bedposts magnetized, yanking the four cuffs up against them with a chiming clang, pinning Clark to the bed spread-eagled, unable to move.

Shock jolted through Clark like electricity and he convulsed wildly against the restraints for a second, pulling at them in a near-frenzy, his vision dark with panic. They didn't give, and Clark went limp with a sharp sound that felt like it had been wrung from him. "Clark," Bruce said, his voice concerned. "Are you all right? Remember the safeword, if you need it." His hand hovered near another button, and worry etched his features.

Clark forced himself to relax, to not writhe against the bonds, to calm down. He could do this, to make Bruce happy. He could do this. Somehow, even through the panic, his erection had stayed achingly stiff and now bobbed, damp and scarlet, against his stomach. "I'm okay," he said carefully, panting. "I'm okay."

Bruce looked at him for a very long time before leaning down to brush a kiss against Clark's mouth. Then he trailed kisses down Clark's neck, across his collarbones, and to Clark's nipples, licking the hard nubs gently. Tenderly. Clark moaned and pushed against Bruce's mouth as much as he could, relieved that Bruce wasn't being rough yet. He wasn't sure he was ready for that, with his body so sensitive, so awake to sensation, so sharply alive. His relief somehow translated into another moan that seemed to have "Please" in it somewhere.

Bruce shifted his mouth to just above Clark's nipple and nipped lightly at the skin.

Clark gasped as the bite sent a tiny twinge of pain through him. So much sensation from such a little action...he made an incoherent noise, struggling to process the unfamiliar input. It felt totally different from the pain of battle: sharper, more delicate, so controlled.

Bruce paused. His breathing was hoarse. "So beautiful," he said, very low, something running under the words like a riptide current under ice. Then his mouth and teeth closed on Clark's nipple, fierce and sharp.

Clark jerked beneath the assault, for a moment all language lost in the influx of sensation. Too much, it was too much...He gasped, "Bruce, stop. Stop. It hurts. Please...it hurts."

Bruce's hand tightened on Clark's hip, achingly painful. "Yes," he breathed. "Oh God, yes." Then his teeth were back on Clark's skin, demanding, hurting, unbearable...

He hadn't said the safeword, Clark realized dimly. He hadn't said "Kryptonite," and so Bruce wasn't going to stop. He had to say it, to stop the torrent of stimulus pounding through his body, lifting him like a tide... He started to, but then bit down on the word. He didn't want to give up so easily. He could wait just a little longer. For Bruce.

Hands that could break any mortal were along his body, precise and overwhelming. Pain was like knives of light through his body, in his mind, shattering him, shaking him loose from himself. White light in patterns on his skin, trailing down him like fire, piercing him...

Part of him (the part of him that wasn't sobbing and moaning ecstatically) understood that what he was feeling was still pain, that the stimuli he was experiencing were, technically speaking, painful. But that part of him seemed to be growing smaller and smaller, and what Bruce was doing felt more and more like pure sensation, transcending anything he had known before, lifting him out of himself, away from language and meaning and into a net of white light and desire. "It hurts, it hurts, it hurts," he heard himself saying, his voice rapt and dreamy, high and far away, and Bruce's hands etched pain into his body like brightness, his voice low and caressing, coaxing, the words beyond Clark's ability to fully comprehend anymore.

Eventually Bruce paused, and Clark focused dazed eyes to see him opening a bottle, preparing to put liquid on his fingers. "No," Clark gasped, his mind still full of fractured light, the rational voice in his head almost extinguished. "Please, no. I want that feeling...inside me, too. Please."

Bruce chuckled and squeezed lube onto his fingers, ignoring Clark's disappointed moan. "You're in no position to make demands, Clark. Besides," he said softly as he moved to kneel between Clark's legs, "Lubricant gives one finer control. You want me to have finer control of this. So I can do things like...this." Heat and light, burning away the last fragments of sanity. "And this." The reporter, the farm boy, the alien, the superhero all vanished in white light, leaving only pure sensation, desire and need.

"You needed this," Bruce said, his voice calm and gentle, adrift in radiance. "You know you needed this."

Clark Kent fell out of himself and into timeless light.

: : :

The ship re-entered Sol's system and yellow light bathed the cockpit and the two men sitting in it. Clark felt the warm light washing over him, easing away the bruises and soreness. Soon no sign would remain on his body of the last two days; no mark to indicate what he had experienced.

Clark sighed.

Bruce shot him a look. "It's all right," he said. His gaze was a caress, a promise, and a shared secret all at once.

Clark smiled and looked back out at the yellow sunlight. Bruce was right.

The marks that mattered weren't on his body anyway.


End file.
